Re: Asimov Site

[CUTblakeney@home.com (Jeff Blakeney)]

Sorry for taking so long to respond but I like to think about my
replies for a bit before sending them out and then I ended up not
doing much online in the past week.  Also, you don't want to know how
many hours I spent replying to this message.  :-)

It wouldn't take me so long if you posts weren't so verbose and
contain so many points that aren't really relevant to the discussion.
I was very tempted to delete most of this message and just leave the
last point, which is pretty much what you entire message boiled down
to, but after spending this much time writing it, I can't be bothered
to figure out what should be deleted and what shouldn't.

On Mon, 04 Sep 2000 03:07:18 GMT, "**** ****" <***@***.com> wrote:
>    If I were only discussing this with one or even a few people, I would
>feel as if the rules were just changed mid-game. That's not the case, and
>it's interesting to hear a different perspective here. However, you must
>realize that the dominant argument here, even the primary argument among
>those who are for further copyright legislation, is the economic impact that
>piracy causes. By choosing this as your defense for the legitimacy of
>copyright law, you are going it alone, so to speak.

I do realize that many people here are arguing that copying old,
commercial, Apple II software isn't causing the copyright holders of
those works any monetary harm.  However, that isn't the point.  The
point is that those works are still protected by their copyright and
it is therefore illegal to distribute them.  Even though most of them
agree that they aren't likely to be taken to court for "pirating"
those works, they still won't say that what they are doing is illegal
nor do they warn others that the URL they are sending them to contains
copyrighted works that are being illegally distributed.

>    Let's take a look at this a moment. Not that software is the best
>example, but when we are talking "intellectual property", for lack of a
>better term, we are talking about something with quite a few different
>qualities than anything else that might be termed property.

Property is property.  Whether it is tangible or intangible is
irrelevant.

>For one, it is unique. Now, this isn't literally true, but is practically
>true. Copyright is actually about enforcing that uniqueness, is one way of
>looking at it.

Not really.  Copyright is about controlling who can have and/or make
copies.  A work can't really be called unique if there are a million
copies in existence.  :-)

Copyright can, in some circumstances, allow the copyright holder to
stop another similar work from being distributed if it contains too
much identical material to theirs.  This is sort of like making their
work unique even if there are a million copies in existence.  However,
if enough of the second work is different from the original, then the
second work can exist as well.

By the way, it is also possible for an identical work to exist if it
can be proven that it was created without using the original work.

>For another, it is eternal, or at least more so than any physical property
>you'll ever find.

This you have backwards.  Physical property is practically eternal,
intellectual property isn't.  My father's family have owned a piece of
land since 1784 and they still own it.  That's 226 years and counting.
Copyrights certainly don't last that long.

>It is arguably more valuable than any physical property. From the
>metaphorical poem that is priceless, to the down-to-earth software that will
>sell millions of dollars worth of 'licenses' for very little to even less
>manufacturing costs...

There are lots of physical things that are priceless too.  The "Mona
Lisa" for example.  There are also lots of ideas that are worthless as
well.  I wouldn't like to speculate about whether physical property is
more or less valuable than intellectual property.  Besides, this is
getting into monetary values again which doesn't apply to copyright
except to determine what type of punishment you get for breaking the
copyright law.

>It has the characteristic of being a "discovered" property, more so than a
>constructed property. In essence, the person who 'writes software' is only
>discovering something, though it may be a highly complex idea.

This I disagree with wholeheartedly.  When I write a program, I'm not
"discovering" something.  I am purposely putting together sequences of
commands to create a specific end result.  I build a program just as
much as I would build a house.

Discovering a program would mean having to do something like drop a
bunch of marbles on my keyboard to find that the program that results
actually does something interesting.  :-)

However, whether the work is created or discovered, if it is
copyrighted, it is still protected by law.

>If someone takes your car, you are 'without' your car. Also, the car thief
>has little excuse, a car is something he has a multitude of ways to acquire
>legitimately. Compare this to software, where they will most likely never
>miss the software (it's still there!), and in our case, something that is
>almost impossible to acquire legitimately, for any price.

What about someone who wants a Fiero?  They can't get that
legitimately anymore because they are no longer in production.  Unless
they can get the company to make them one, start producing them again
or get someone who owns one to sell them theirs they can't get one
without stealing one.  If they don't want to steal it, they'll just
have to live without it.

The same goes for software.

>    Now, let's look for a rationale for copyright protection, if not for
>economic reasons, and the whole "if they can't get paid, why will they
>continue to create?" BS.

Being compensated for what you do isn't BS.  I've already explained
that compensation doesn't have to be monetary.  There is also no need
to start creating more terms like "credit-right" and so on.  If a
person has a copyright on something then only they have the "right" to
"copy" it or allow copies to be made.  That is what copyright is all
about.

In the case of the poem being written for one person, once you create
it, it is copyrighted.  If you only want that one person to have a
copy of that poem then that is the only person who can legally have a
copy of it until you either change your mind and let more people have
it or the copyright expires.  The law does support situations like
that.

In the case of GE changing light bulb sockets, that isn't a copyright
issue.  It would most likely be a patent issue.  Besides, unless GE
holds a patent on the old sockets and also patents the new design,
they won't have the control of the market required to make them a
monopoly.  Even if they did own both patents, someone would come up
with a new design and let lots of companies license it and their
design would become the new standard.  Beta versus VHS is a good
example here.

In the case of control freaks, copyright gives them the right to be
control freaks.  If they don't want to let anyone have it, that is
their right.  I might get just as upset as you about a situation like
that but it still doesn't give either of us the right to ignore the
copyright.

You then did a paragraph speculating about why people want control.  I
won't respond to it as some of the points were pretty muddled or hard
to understand so I don't want to assume that you meant something and
get it wrong.  Besides, as far as I can tell, you didn't really relate
it to copyrights except to speculate about how the law could be
changed.

>As such, let's look at
>the disadvantages of the "control" aspect of a copyright.
>    It wasn't the intention when copyright law was written, and still isn't.

I have no idea what the original intent of copyright law was but I
know the law has changed over time so I'm pretty sure it isn't the
same now as it was then.  Today, copyright law is definitely about
control, though.

>    Loss of control in and of itself, constitutes no damage to the copyright
>holder, financial or otherwise.

It most certainly does.  If I lose control over my property (ie my car
or my e-mail client that I am writing) then I can no longer keep
people from doing what they want with that property (ie taking my car
for a joyride or distributing a modified version of my e-mail client).
That would definitely be quite harmful.

>    It is a dangerous privilege, that is likely to encourage abuse more than
>anything else.

I don't understand this line.  Who would be abusing what?

>    Loss of control is not likely to discourage people to do creative work
>in any significant way.

It most certainly would.  Taking away their control would mean that
they would receive less compensation and I've already discussed the
compensation issue.

>    It is a childish attitude, and one that isn't wise to encourage on the
>level of a global society.

Personally, I think it is pretty childish to whine about the fact that
you can't get something that you want or to take something that
doesn't belong to you.

>    Honestly, I'm trying my hardest not to dismiss such an argument
>outright, but I have trouble not doing that. Perhaps you could enlighten me
>as to why you feel you have supreme authority over intellectual property,
>simply because you happened to be the first person to document that you
>thought of it?

I feel that I have supreme authority over intellectual property that I
create because I spent the time learning how to create it and actually
creating it.

In the case of the e-mail program I am currently writing.  It didn't
simply pop into existence on my machine.  (If it had I would have
released it by now. :)  I had to take quite some time to learn how to
program well enough to attempt this and I've also put in quite a bit
of time in the past two years working on that program.

Now, why do you feel that a person who has spent no time learning how
to program well enough to attempt writing an e-mail client or hasn't
spent the time writing an e-mail client, should have the right to do
what they want with my e-mail client?

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| Jeff Blakeney - Dean of the Apple II University in A2Pro on Delphi     |
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